Microsoft taking a hard line with Windows 8 tablet makers

Windows 8 tablets will apparently be available from just a handful of OEMs and …

Windows 8 tablets will be tightly controlled by Microsoft, according to insiders speaking to Bloomberg. The company is pressuring chip manufacturers to partner with just a single system builder for their tablet machines, and an optional second system builder for clamshell type machines. Each chip/builder pair will only be able to produce one system with each design.

Other sources also claim that systems will have to meet strict requirements covering performance, wake-from-sleep, and other criteria. In return for complying with these rules, the chip companies will receive certain incentives, such as richer features or lower software prices.

Bloomberg's sources suggested that Microsoft will produce two famillies of the Windows 8 operating system: the regular desktop family, with its range of versions, and a special mobile-oriented family; the restrictions will only apply to the latter group. The chip manufacturers in question would hence be the system-on-chip manufacturers—Qualcomm, Texas Instruments, NVIDIA, and perhaps a mystery fourth company producing ARM chips; Intel and perhaps AMD would produce x86 ones. With four, five, or possibly six different chip families, there's still ample scope for a diverse range of tablets.

However, some system builders are apparently unhappy with this policy. Speaking at the Computex trade show in Taipei, Acer CEO J. T. Wang described the restrictions as "troublesome," and complained that Microsoft is "controlling the whole thing, the whole process."

Wang is also chairman of the Taipei Computer Association (TCA), and the TCA is reported to be pressuring the Taiwan government to intervene.

The restrictions are, however, understandable. Though x86 Windows has long supported an enormous variety of configurations, ARM Windows is brand new, and a conservative approach may be the safer bet. The only tablet that has been truly successful is Apple's iPad, and Apple's tight control over software, hardware, and marketing, has been instrumental in bringing a well-built, well-designed, usable product to market.

Though less successful, tablets running Google's Android 3.0 Honeycomb release are also subject to many constraints, with only a single SoC (the Tegra 250) supported, and minimal variations in screen resolution and other specifications. A carefully-controlled, restricted specification makes it much easier to ensure the kind of appliance-like robustness and ease of use that Microsoft wants for its tablet operating system.

Limiting the number of different systems might also preclude the kind of problems that Redmond has seen strike its fledgling smartphone platform, Windows Phone. Bugs introduced by OEMs that broke the software's update system have caused tremendous headaches for the company, and reduced diversity with greater testing may be instrumental in avoiding a repeat of those issues.

However, there are risks to the strategy. If Microsoft sets the specification too low—either as a deliberate ploy to protect full-featured laptops, or as a failure to keep up with technological advances—then Windows tablets will be undesirable and uncompetitive out of the gate. As seen from the Acer CEO's comments, there is also resistance to this strategy from OEMs.